Wijdan Michael Salim, was quoted by the AFP and reported in the London Based Al Sharq Al Awsat newspaper on the 27th of January, to have conceded that there are no complete lists of prisoners in Iraq and many have been held without charge or trial.This is after the Iraqi minister for women affairs Fatin Abdul Rahman Mahmoud was quoted in December in Azzman Iraqi newspaper to have said there is a ‘large number’ of women in detention in Iraq.
Many according to the Iraqi based Azzaman report are held in lieu of their men folk. It is a well known fact that the number of Iraqi women prisoners has increased again since the ‘new American surge’. Three weeks ago there was a demonstration in the province of Ramady, calling on the US forces to release Wasan, arrested in lieu of her male relation, in violation of International Humanitarian Law.
What is also more worrying the claim made by the Iraqi general secretary of the union for prisoners and prisoners of war Mohamed Adham Al Hamed, that the number of Iraqi women who have faced detention since the start of the occupation is 10 000.
He laments the unsuitable conditions these women are held in and their vulnerability to sexual abuse. In some detention centres, the only thing that separates the men and women sections is a makeshift curtain.
DEMOCRACY!
